The PDMA Handbook of New Product Development

14.3. Techniques for Deeply Understanding Customer Needs

Firms can obtain detailed understanding of customer needs through at least three market research techniques:

• Be an involved customer who has those needs and problems.

• Critically observe and live with customers who have those needs.

• Talk to customers with those needs.

Table 1 summarizes the main aspects of these techniques. Additional techniques that provide alternative methods for understanding needs can be found in Chapters 15, 16, and 17.

14.3.1. Be a User: Be an Involved Customer of Your Own and Competitor's Goods and Services

Being a user is the simplest technique for uncovering needs.

14.3.1.1. What to Do and Keys to Success.

An enormous amount of customer needs knowledge and understanding can be gained by putting every development team member in situations where he/she is actively involved customers with the problems your firm is trying to solve. Also, when your firm already has a product commercialized in a particular functional area, encourage team members to use your products and all competitive products routinely in "everyday" as well as "extraordinary" situations.

At one company, both men and women work on the product development team for a feminine hygiene pad product. Teams at this company are known for the lengths to which they go to try to fully understand and identify with customer problems. The entire team personally tests their own and competitors' current and new products. Male team members have worn pads ...